Global coral bleaching five times greater than 1980s: study

Yahoo - AFP, January 4, 2018

A scuba diver checks coral reefs in the Red Sea off the southern Israeli resort 

city of Eilat on June 12, 2017 (AFP Photo/MENAHEM KAHANA)

Miami (AFP) - Coral bleaching, a deadly disease that strikes reefs when oceans heat up, has risen nearly five-fold since the 1980s, threatening the future of these vital ecosystems, researchers said Thursday.

Severe coral bleaching events used to happen once every 25 to 30 years. Now, they occur every six years on average, said the report in the journal Science.

"Before the 1980s, mass bleaching of corals was unheard of," said lead author Terry Hughes, director of the Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies.

"But now, repeated bouts of regional-scale bleaching and mass mortality of corals has become the new normal around the world as temperatures continue to rise."

Millions of people worldwide depend on corals for their livelihoods, whether for tourism or scuba diving, or for the fish and sea creatures that make their homes in reefs.

When water temperatures rise suddenly, algae in the corals can die, cutting off an important source of nutrients. If warming persists for several months, corals can turn white and die.

The study analyzed bleaching events at 100 locations around the world between 1980 and 2016.

In the last few years, 30 percent of bleaching episodes could be described as "severe," extending tens to hundreds of miles, or kilometers.

The risk of severe bleaching has risen about four percent per year since 1980.

'Stress response'

"Coral bleaching is a stress response caused by exposure of coral reefs to elevated ocean temperatures," said co-author Andrew Baird, also of Coral CoE.

"When bleaching is severe and prolonged, many of the corals die. It takes at least a decade to replace even the fastest-growing species."

The risk of bleaching events has increased most strongly over time in Australia, parts of Asia and the Middle East.

The Great Barrier Reef has bleached four times since 1998, including back-to-back events in 2016 and 2017 that wreaked massive damage.

Many but not all bleaching events are driven by the tropical warming trend known as El Nino, which last peaked in 2015 and 2016.

Climate change -- and the continued burning of fossil fuels -- is also playing a role, making bleaching events increasingly common.

"The climate has warmed rapidly in the past 50 years, first making El Ninos dangerous for corals, and now we're seeing the emergence of bleaching in every hot summer," said co-author C. Mark Eakin of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Hughes said he hopes the study will "help spur on the stronger action needed to reduce greenhouse gases in Australia, the United States and elsewhere."

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“2011 and Beyond” - What you are seeing, and why - Jan 16, 2010 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Text version)

"....The Prediction: The Renewal of the Life Cycle

When you change the temperature strata of the oceans of the earth, things start to change, for the life cycle of the food in the ocean depends upon that which is the smallest. The plankton of the planet survive in certain temperatures, and that's changing. Throw away what you think you know about how it's all supposed to work, and instead think "renewal" or "how did it begin." This will serve you to understand what is happening now. This cycle is built to replenish the ocean with life and not always by sustaining the kind that was there.

Let us just talk about the ocean for a moment. We won't even get to what's happening in the air and what mammals might experience. Let's just speak of the ocean. Have you heard about the salmon? What has your science warned you against? You're overfishing! The sea is dying. The coral is dying. The reefs are going away. You're not seeing the food chain that used to be there. You've overfished everything. Fishing quotas have been set up to help this. Oh, all those little people in the red room - they don't know about the purple. Red people only know about the red paradigm.

Did you hear about the salmon recently? There's too many of them! In the very place where quotas are in place so you won't overfish, they're jumping in the boats! Against all odds and any projections from environmentalists or biologists, they're overrunning the oceans in Alaska - way too many fish.

What does that tell you? Is it possible that Gaia takes care of itself? That's what it tells you! Perhaps this alignment is going to keep humanity fed. Did anybody think of this? What if Gaia is in alliance with you? What if the increase in consciousness that raised your DNA vibration has alerted Gaia to change the weather cycle and get ready to feed humanity? Are you looking at the ocean where the oil spill occurred? It's recovering in a way that was not predicted. What's happening?

The life cycle itself is being altered by the temperature change of the ocean and much of what you have believed is the paradigm of life in the sea is slowly changing. A new system of life is appearing, as it has before, and is upon you in your lifetime. It will compliment what you know and expose you to a new concept: Gaia regularly refreshes the life cycle on Earth.

Within this process, there will be the extinction of certain plants and animals, birds and fish. My advice to you, especially to those environmentalists, is to understand the cycle of life so that you may relax with what nature has always done. It puts life on the planet to serve the planet for a time. When certain life no longer serves the planet in the ways it used to, it takes it away. The extinction of life, especially through weather change, is normal for Gaia. It is honored, appropriate and normal, even if you don't think so. Don't try to save all the disappearing animals, fish and birds! Some are supposed to go away. And, dear ones, don't assign all this activity to something you did to cause it!

The red people are stressing. The purple is here, and they are trying to figure out what they did wrong. They don't know they are in the Rainbow Room. They think they are in the RED ROOM. This is what the Rainbow Room does; it changes colors. So as the room does what it has always done, the red people are sitting there in fear trying to figure out what it is that they did that possibly could have caused the purple to appear.

The Rainbow Room is beautiful. The color purple is significant. Going from red to purple has metaphysical significance within this parable, but I'll let you figure it out. For those who are into colors, there's a reason why I gave those two. The earth is becoming more sacred than it's ever been before. Gaia is with you in this. It's cooperating in ways you never thought it could, in the way biologists said it would not. You think you're killing it? Instead, it's giving birth to an altered ecological system. ...."